1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lever connector to be attached to a panel.
2. Description of the Related Art
A conventional lever connector to be attached to a panel includes a female connector (first connector), a male connector (second connector) to be fitted with the female connector, and a lever which is provided to the male connector and causes both connectors to be fitted with each other by rotation thereof. The lever connector is attached to an attachment hole formed on the panel in a state where both connectors are fitted with each other.
In such a lever connector, an interference portion which can interfere with a hole edge of the attachment hole of the panel, is formed on a side surface which is located at a rear surface side in a rotation direction of the lever (for example, see Patent Literature 1: Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2002-359037). The interference portion does not interfere with the hole edge of the attachment hole of the panel when both connectors have a normal fitted state, and interferes with the hole edge of the attachment hole when both connectors have a partial fitted state. Thereby, in a process of attaching both connectors to the attachment hole of the panel, it is possible to detect a fitted state of both connectors by determining whether or not the interference portion interferes with the hole edge of the attachment hole.
However, in the above-described conventional lever connector, since the interference portion is formed on the side surface which is located at the rear surface side in the rotation direction of the lever, a degree of interference between the interference portion and the hole edge of the attachment hole becomes small when the lever approaches a horizontal direction with respect to a direction in which both connectors are fitted with each other. This makes it difficult to detect the partial fitted state even if both connectors actually have the partial fitted state. In addition, in order to improve the detection of the partial fitted state, it is considered to extend the interference portion outward with respect to the rotation direction of the lever. However, this has a possibility that the lever connector has a large size.